


The Cull

by VindictiveStorm



Series: ACOP2019 - Happy Ver. [3]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Drunk Lena Luthor, Established Relationship, F/F, Hurt Alex Danvers, Protective Lena Luthor, They'll take Alex from Lena over her very cold dead body
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-12
Updated: 2019-11-12
Packaged: 2021-01-29 05:00:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21404587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VindictiveStorm/pseuds/VindictiveStorm
Summary: ACOP2019 Day 3: DEO - When Lena learns somethings about the DEO, when she learns she may lose Alex to the long shadows the organization had, something flips inside of her.
Relationships: Alex Danvers/Lena Luthor
Series: ACOP2019 - Happy Ver. [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1541182
Comments: 8
Kudos: 61





	The Cull

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by LogicalPremise and their 'Of Sheep and Battle Chicken' - because there /can/ be greater reasons for villains to exist, there /can/ be valid reasons that explains some people hold certain intentions, there /can/ be some unique way to weave reason, motive, and significance to institutions rather than being satisfied by how they are used rather than why they exist. Thank you for teaching me to question poor use of antagonists and organizations and how to make them relevant, not simply decorative.

Alex doesn’t even flinch as the bottle sails right by her head. It’s infuriating, Lena thinks, the sheer arrogance the woman has. Having decimated most of the bottle herself, Lena knew that she had absolutely no business trying to aim anything at anyone, as if she’s actually a functional person, after drinking that much. But did Alex know? Did she? Did she just assume Lena would miss? Did she just assume she’s good enough to sidestep anything, and so she won’t even bother trying?

“You’re not invincible,” Lena seethes, from her rather pathetic position on the couch, bedridden, as it were. “You aren’t some lightning rod, even lightning rod’s have a maximum capacity.” And Alex is only human, Lena knows, now she knows that Alex is definitely … there’s way to grammatically frame her thoughts, this is the worst. She groans out loud, though it gradually turns into a shameless moan when a cool palm presses on her forehead and warmed cheek. 

“Don’t touch me,” Lena purrs, nuzzling Alex’s hands. They were rough, there were scars, and because Alex stole her moisturizers, they often had a sweet scent, mixed with smoke, because her woman was too hot for her own good sometimes. But most importantly, “your hands are already full … of secrets, can’t have me too.”

That’s when the warm caresses, the lazy petting stops altogether. Lena doesn’t remember telling Alex she could stop her demonstrations in affection. She frowns as she tries, really, really hard, to recall what she last said - maybe she had told the brunette to stop, after all?

“Lena, why are you so sad?” Alex asks her, interrupting her own thoughts. Impaired as she is, she can’t disguise her absolute awe at Alex’s … it isn’t only her perception, but to treat Lena, drunk Lena, as intelligent, as keen, as sober Lena. Silly Alex. But silly Alex is also kind, loving, respectful, and someone Lena is comfortable fighting with, not against, never against. And that’s right. She started drinking because she needed to start a fight with Alex, over her stupid secrets. That she had to find out from ...

“Lex,” Alex tilts her head, “No. Lex!” 

“Did he send you something again?” 

“N- Yes! But not-not like last time. Not a pony.” 

“Unless he’s endangering the world again, I really want to give him a single pass just for that. Is that what you’re sad about? Me taking his side, even as a joke?” 

“No, but now I am.” Then suddenly she isn’t, not when Alex kisses her so sweetly. “Shut up.” She tells her, holding onto her cheeks, pulling her for another one, “stop being pretty and listen.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Alex chuckles as she squishes Lena further against the couch, making some space for herself. 

“Lex sent me some … history. It’s DEO, but not DEO. Like, DEO isn’t DEO. That can’t be right, because you’re DEO.” Lena rambled, summarizing the harrowing papers he emailed her. The bottle has done its job since she popped it open at 6PM, lifting terror from the forefront of her mind, but the contents were crystal clear, rattling everything inside of her. And unfortunately, she knew that when she woke up in Alex’s embrace, terror would reshape itself anew in her as well. But at least she would wake up in Alex’s arms - a million times better than waking up wondering if Alex was going to ever show up again.

“Try again. What about the DEO?”

“You. You aren’t supposed to be DEO, there isn’t supposed to be a DEO,” Lena pauses at that, hands stilling from where she had curled them into the front of Alex’s shirt. “That’s not right though. You’re DEO, you’re here. You’re mine. You aren’t … my imagination, you’re here, I’ve been inside you. Why is Lex lying to me? Or … have you been lying to me?” 

Alex shakes her head vehemently at that, her longer strands flying, as she tilts Lena’s chin, forcing them to meet eye to eye, “I haven’t lied to you. I know you’re drunk, and sad, and I’m sorry I’m just seeing it now, that you’re terrified about whatever you read - but you know the truth, or at least there is one truth that hasn’t changed just yet - the DEO exists. You visited me yesterday with lunch, we rigged some of the doors to make some really obnoxious sounds when they opened, and when you were leaving I had to chase you down 2 streets because you left your visitors card on my table.” Alex reminds her slowly, gently, lulling Lena to sleep. “Whatever doubts you have, leave them with me, just for a few hours, I’ll keep them safe until you wake up.”

“... Promise?” Lena asks, tempted by warmth and rest. 

“Mmhm. Of course.”

\- - -

When Alex wakes up, Lena isn’t underneath her anymore. And her back hurts like hell. Sitting upright, she glances around, and frowns when she sees Lena downing some red wine by the kitchen island. “Len …” she yawns, and this time she yelps when a champagne flute breaks into pieces just a few ways away from her head with however little wine was left inside splashing onto her cheeks. Although alarmed, Alex was in no was truly threatened, the small spike in adrenaline only helped to clear the haze slumber had left in her. “Is this about last night? Did your brother send you something serious? I’m sorry if I just … made it into a joke?” 

When Lena returns to the couch, she drops a packet of papers, the email in question then. Alex reaches over to them, but is stopped when Lena catches her hand, its a firm grip, its … desperate, it’s Lena silently begging for comfort. So rather than the papers, Alex grabs Lena instead, pulling her between her legs. “Why don’t I start?” Alex offers, running a soothing hand against her back. 

“How much do you even know about the DEO?” Lena chokes, twisting in her arms, unwilling to face her now, “Who is above the DEO? Who is in between the DEO and the very top? Do you even know Alex?” the raven haired woman questions her, almost hysterically. Pressing her forehead between Lena’s shoulder blades, Alex breathes her confession quietly. 

“I don’t,” she admits, and when she feels Lena tremble, she is quick to still her, grabbing her wrists. “I don’t know who or what is above the DEO, and I’m aware that I was deliberately … left to be ignorant of it.” 

“...J’onn, he didn’t tell you?” 

“He doesn’t need to; he can’t. Not even Hank knew.”

“Do you know how long the DEO - how long you have, then? If J’onn steps down-”

“When, he steps down.”

“Then it’s already too late! As soon as he’s taken from the DEO-”

“That doesn’t mean I can just leave.” 

“Why not!? You don’t know who is in charge of all of you, beyond J’onn, you can recite the DEO’s mandate and mission, but you don’t know whose orders those were, when those orders were made - you’re a cell, a branch, an extension from something bigger - something without a name, without a face. You know this sounds bad, you know there’s a void where there should be a trail, you need to leave it, baby.” 

“And where would I go Lena, I know there’s some trap, I know there are so many eyes, I know there’s some countdown that I can’t read or hear, but even if I turn tail, and pack my bags, where can I go?!” Alex pulls herself up, hands gripping her hair in frustration, now basking in the fear they’ve both aired out, “they know who I am, they know Alex Danvers, they know I’m next in line, I’m basically the god damn Bell of Condolence - when J’onn leaves, and I step up, they’re going to start the cull.” 

“No, Lex says they’re going to resume plans from a long time ago. Before you, or your father, joined.” 

“I’m going to go ahead and take a guess that I still end up dead?”

“Over my cold dead body.” 

“I know they’ve been doing some underhanded shit forever. Cutting funding without explanation, malfunctioning armor and weapons, they’ve been weeding out our numbers for something - even when General Lane and Senator Crane were sent over, they weren’t just sneaking around for our numbers, or unreported resources … what were they doing?” 

“The only thing that stops them from taking all of you out any day of the week is Supergirl, she’s public, she’s visible, she makes you visible. Did they try to remove her? Repeatedly? As soon as she’s gone, the DEO would slink back into the shadows - and no one would know if you were wiped out then, when Supergirl’s shining down elsewhere.” 

“They’re making us rogue, then. False orders, false leader, no one is responsible for us, no one knows how and why we’re here … is that it?” 

“Only the very top knows all those things. It’s how CADMUS is around - the evidence that foreign hands, aliens, had shaped our history, and herded humanity down a certain path, for some outcome we haven’t reached yet. Lex and my mother had CADMUS to try and discourage and break whatever path had been laid out - but the DEO? Lex can’t find that trail. No one can find it, no one alive remembers. You’re not just going to be turned rogue, and hunted down - they’re leaving you out to dry, to call the sharks out to reclaim and recollect you.” 

“Fuck …” And Lena stills when she feels Alex tremble instead. Removing herself from the redhead, she sits next to her and pulls the shaking woman into her arms, fuck - they were both shaking, she realizes as she tries to grasp onto Alex’s hands, finding difficulty in entwining them, in finding the strength to hold on with everything she had. “Fuck,” a small, weak voice quivers and Lena holds on all the more tighter at that. 

If Alex thought she was going down alone, or down at all, she was dead wrong, Lena thought feverishly, as their grips became painful, but neither were brave enough to part. As Alex curled into her, Lena wraps her arm to secure the woman all the more. Seconds later, cradled by the coldest, the loneliest woman she knows, Alex cries. And Lena sheds more than a few tears, knowing that she lacked the warmth to heal the woman, her woman, made aware of her numbered days.

Breathing in sharply though, her resolve was alit once again, and raking her nails into red tresses, Lena presses her lips against her scalp, “I won’t let them take you from me, love,” she promises solemnly, as a fire begins to shimmer in her - its indignity, it's a cry against the injustice of it all. It's the resolve to ruin everything and anything that took the fight out of the woman who met Lena on a battlefield the day they met, the night they fell in love, and every time they kissed. 

“Leave the DEO,” she tells Alex firmly, after every tear had been wiped away. “Leave it, burn your shadows, your ashes, the smoke … I’ll take care of everything else, but I can’t fight this … I can’t fight this alone, I need you to come to me, I need you to make the decision to fight this and not just die on your knees, love.”

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry if this doesn't make much sense. I am just not satisfied by how the DEO came to be. We only know what they do, and sure we know why, but its a very cheap story for them. I'm giving them a different history. 
> 
> Given that there isn't a good reason for the DEO to exist in the show beyond 'the government needs them', we're going to flirt with the idea that the DEO doesn't even know why it was formed, or who exactly formed them - just like in the show! Do you know what kind of organizations have these characteristics? Insignificant ones. We flirt with the idea then, that the DEO is just a minor division, a small cell, of a larger leader organization, whose mission, intentions, objectives are unknown, but had needed the DEO to further their own agenda. But what happens when the leader organization stops giving out new orders? Goes dark? Left as a cell without a leader, without their own objectives, and then having J'onn take over to steer them - they're a rogue cell. They are a risk. J'onn is wise and old enough to maneuver away from dangerous waters, but Alex? As soon as she takes over, its the perfect opportunity to wipe them off the map for good. Or to try and find who their leader organization is, who went dark, who truly rebelled, like CADMUS had.


End file.
